On the Cover: Venus' highest mountain, Maxwell Montes, appears in this new map compiled from data returned by the Soviet Venera 15 and 16 orbiters. The main mountain (shown here In red and white) is part of a tectonic mountain belt and spans about 1,000 km from north to south. Maxwell Montes rises 11 km above Venus'mean surface; Earth's tallest peak, Mauna Loa, is only 8 km above the Pacific Ocean floor. Tying strips of altimetric data together to produce this preliminary map was an arduous task; elaborate image enhancement and radar-image mosaics will be completed later.Image provided by Harold Masursky, with computer processing by Laurence Soderblom and Robert Gurule, USGS